


Fourwords (Loyalty)

by blindtaleteller



Series: Platovember Prompts 2020 [27]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst and Feels, Flashbacks, Gen, Loss, Loyalty, Platovember, Platovember 2020, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Pre-Relationship, Surprises, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Unresolved Tension, War, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:02:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28214418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blindtaleteller/pseuds/blindtaleteller
Summary: Steve is stuck shellshocked, somewhere between reliving a memory of World War II and half dazing his way through the aftermath of Shield's fall; after downing the carriers Hydra built while within their ranks: trying to deal with the very personal regrets and bittersweet little joys his internal conflict bring him back to revisiting the safe house Loki took them to during the whole mess. It isn't just one old friend who's left him behind. But not without a reminder of an old promise, either.
Relationships: platonic - Relationship
Series: Platovember Prompts 2020 [27]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1999015
Kudos: 4
Collections: Loki, Platonic Relationships, Prompted Writing





	Fourwords (Loyalty)

**Author's Note:**

> Door/Universe 6's Steve Rogers aka Likn, in a between scene that splits between flashbacks of a particular skirmish during 1943 World War II, and what happens in the aftermath of their Winter Soldier arc. If you were wondering, and part of why I chose Steve for this one: is not just this short already having this theme, but the fact that this Steve's Coven Moniker; Likn, literally means 'Loyal' as it's first definition.
> 
> It's also worth noting that the two words that make up the title, were purposely not separated.  
> Read it out loud, and when you get to the very last word in the short story, say them loud again: and you might get one of the other threads my muses tucked there in the meaning.
> 
> In a way, this also connects with Door 8 in GROUNDED: with Wolfkin, Lolo/Loke, and Door 5's Gin: as this particular flashback covers D6's tank ambush event as it happened for this particular Universe. The details change a bit from door to door in Lokiverse: but the main situation remains.
> 
> I hope I wrote this in a way that can be understood, as far as the flashbacks overlapping with Steve's current situation.
> 
> Enjoy! And by all means please leave me a comment if you can telling me what you thought?  
> Scenes like this one with the overlap are always a little rough, and I end up uncertain about them..

  * IDENTIFY LOCATION: LIKN - DIMENSIONAL IDENTIFICATION CONFIRMED : HVRA0616-9H-06
  * \---INTER-UNIVERSAL DOORWAY ENTRY POINT H6 : OBSERVATIONAL STATUS - TVA INTERFERENCE : _NONE DETECTED_
  * \---- MIDGARD: NORTH AMERICAN CONTINENT: VISITATION CAUTIONS _HEAVILY_ _ADVISED :_ WASHINGTON D.C.
  * \------KNOWN DOMESTIC TIME VARIANCE : 3:42 PM US EST : 2014



## ~\\\\-FOURWORDS-//~

No reason to it that he could see. There wasn't any comparison to the cold and the deep and smoky-misted dark wild of the battlefield in Belgium on the edge of those woods in his memory, and the ordered florescent-bright greys of cement walls and heavy steel supports, reflective yellow paint that marked the metal guards punctuating the lanes down into the parking garage he knew even better.

But Steve could see the dark shape of the trees anyway, in those barely there flashes when the overheads flickered: eyes already on that hidden door, watching as they cut into it. It was the machinery out there that they needed to get through that door, that was hitting the power to that flicker; blacking out the light in sporadic little cuts. He had nothing to say, eyes on the sparks outside the car; Sam sitting next to him just as quiet and watching Steve as much as he was watching that same motion. Natasha in the front passenger, so adamant all the way here; looking a lot less than that between the glance at him in the rear view mirror and what must have looked like an almost dazed stare as they cut into their place off Fourth, under the mall parking structure.

Maybe, it was the powerless feeling jumping numbly up and down his spine.

The realization between the dark and position; the numbers with the Germans dragging Buck to that singular crooked, long-outed street lamp when they had finally caught up to him. The tanks; three of them caging the center of the lot stopped on the road where they'd caught him and letting them see in barely there flashes over the man-made rise the other side of the ditch that he was still fighting as much as he could, being dragged by some length around his neck: being compared to the five count of SUVs just like the one he was in right that moment, watching them cut into Loki's safe space.

Maybe, it was the sensation of loss. The realization there were enough there, shooting through them before they shot Bucky Barnes: especially in that hooded darkness? Would be not just close but next to impossible. The possibility whispered in the string of almost silent curses from one or two of the rest of their team that had followed him out there the moment they had noticed he was missing: mid meeting. Just, after the brighter brass had delivered the blow of ordering them to stay out of it.

That not just Rogers' team but their whole side of that track was standing back and standing down while the German armored reinforcements pinched in on the infantry that had been converted in need, to a supply company on the other side of that mess. On Buck's friend. The guy that, had literally saved his life at least once since they'd settled into lending a hand with the siege on that backwoods factory. Saved more of theirs with food, and meds, and more that they wouldn't have had otherwise.

Not a one of their boys had to ask where he'd gone, even if the brass was. Same place they'd all wanted to go. Remembering the shitty crackers and stale, squeezy brown packets of colored cheese that tasted like food coloring and slightly salted lard more than real food? But had kept them alive. Stolen german rations too when they were really lucky. Dry, sometimes a little blue mincemeat loafs and brick-hard tack you could soak for a half an hour and finally make it soft enough to not have to worry about breaking your teeth.

Maybe that was it. That feeling of betrayal; the moments and minutes they'd lost before they had picked up their stuff talking about it instead of going, compared to sitting there un-cuffed in that seat: feeling like he was bound head to toe in a loop of that doubt, that question. Steve found himself looking at his hands where they were. And knew that yes.

That's a part of what it was. Hesitating back in their tent at command to break rank, and paying for it when they finally caught up just those few minutes too late. The comparison. Found coming to, out at riverside miles away from where he was now; hearing the fight between Loki and Buck farther down before he saw it. Hearing the safeties come off before the first shots that broke them apart. The words he couldn't hear them exchange, and the string of that chain up over the lamp post. The way his voice wouldn't work as he'd sat up here in DC and reached like he could stop them; compared to the knot in his throat getting ready to charge for the line anyway.

The surprise of a hand on his shoulder in the woods when that unexpected volley came out of the woods on the other side knocking out what lighting the tanks _had,_ had: compared with the reach that had surprised even Bucky after being blown back by a shot from an Eagle bullet's velocity recoil and exposing his head, Loki catching the bullet from the dead shot through his temple.

Giving the platoon away that second before the chain was shot free from the other side. Giving himself away, for the facts of what he looked like even with the mask he'd lost somewhere between teh carriers and the river bank; and how many men like him were bulletproof, and could just ... look directly at Steve Rogers after the grin to Hill, put that hand on the Winter Soldier's metal arm after he'd just dropped the slug; and vanish, like that.

They were at the rush now. The sudden focused push and pull of his company to get in there and get the convoy from the other side with the hope they could do so before the man who'd been dragging him put a bullet in Barnes anyway; after the ** _'Go!'_** and _'Now, Captain.'_ that had hissed in whispers like silk over his shoulder after that pat and the realization the new man next to him had been leveling a rifle in the direction of those tanks. The clang of the next internal bar when the cutter snapped through the second to last beam holding it solid-shut on the other side. The shots slipping past his shoulders, his head from behind him as well as the other side of the rickety dark road; making that beeline for Bucky in smoke and mist.

Another half muffled but echoing clang from the other side of their safe house door, Steve had the car door handle in his hand and swung open out of it again. Nat jumping to attention and a little slower. Sam half jogging around the front to catch up with his long legs as Fury looked back at him from that hipped-hands, as happy about it as Steve was expression.

The view of that familiar pistol profile, coming in late. Luger, P08; pulling up for the back of Bucky's head while he was beating the first german soldier down with what was left of the chain. The wind up for his shield coming late.

Crowbars at the edge. Three teams of two to open it without the slide in operation. The door was huge, nearly a foot thick. They could hear motion hurried on the other side: and there was the next comparison. The No. The want to slam that door shut, or pry it open: do something more. Be more able to. Wind things back and skip the tent. Wind things back and run a break past the agents shooting at them by the river.

The sounds just had them bringing over another team to open the slab of steel and concrete in the parking garage faster. Get it out of the way while Nick was burning a single eye worth of laser-point stare at the side of Rogers' face: and he was trying to remember to breathe. Hoping they were there, wishing they weren't. Praying someone else had found their way in and that wasn't them they all could hear further down that narrow little corridor leading to the right and back.

The rush of boots on the pavement here. The silence his heat had been bumping so hard to make run up in his ears when the Luger's hammer was cocked back. He was right behind them; right there when they went in.

And he didn't expect it; not now any more than he had then. The sudden relief.

The emptiness of that concrete room now, when he turned and they were checking the shallow shelf-dressers; the still swinging motion of a cord from the ceiling so recently loosed from the absent tech cage Loki had been keeping the Tesseract in that almost no one really paid attention to what had been left on the steel table there.

The sudden speed and stop on and in perfect target of that knife whipping past Steve's ear in the woods under that dead lamp post, sinking in at the shoulder; slicing tendons belonging to the fingers holding that gun and on their way to pulling that trigger finger: only to have it drop limply and give Steve the breath of the moment he had needed to knock the bastard down completely with his full charge. Bucky hearing this in the same moment; whipping around and pulling that knife from the man who had been about to kill him and saluting whoever had thrown it with a thankful dopey grin like he knew him before they were really in it and trying to keep the drivers from their tanks. And the gunners from getting more shots off.

Because and as Buck explained to them later in the brig while they waited their turns for debriefing and what punishments were coming: he had, known him.

Nothing there for the former agents of Shield to find, in the present. The new strike team was rushing out again behind him while he looked around. Sam was starting to wander the outer edges of the room; letting out a low whistle for the fact he had seen what it had looked like before, just that once: but that once had been enough. All the salvage was gone. All the tech. All the emergency bunks pushed up folded against the wall neatly and sans blankets and pillows. Bucky and Loki had taken even those. No tools at his empty wore-out workbenches in the corner. No saw table either. They took that. Not even the stupid little cartoon-print curtain Cap had complained about Lo pulling over the single-strip lights above rather than shutting them out. It was even cleaner than the garage proper ten feet outside that cut down hidden door under the McDonalds upstairs.

When it was done, just like then; there was quiet. The settling of last breaths and grumbles of men --agents who failed to catch them now, and captives who failed to kill them then-- and the shadow. The officer whose profile Bucky had grinned at and raised a hand to with that knife as an offer when the clear was called out; the Brit that Steve only barely had knowledge of other than owing them their lives, when Bucky had come out here to save _them_ with the intention of taking out those, and the rest of the tanks that had snuck between their lines in the night.

The shadow that was in this room now as Steve's eyes fixed on one of the three things still left in the room; sitting on that table in place of the big, slapped together box doing it's level best at suppressing the Tesseract. One of two knives, sitting right next to his shield; waiting for them.

No. That wasn't right. He could hear the call out after the older sight of him; feel the fight-hardened breath in his lungs. The joyful, sarcastic, thankful accusation of instantly infallible respect.

_'You guys really don't know to follow orders any more than we do tonight, huh!'_

The pause then, he could almost see the smirk, hear the surprised derision to the words. _'It isn't about that, Captain!'_

The pause Nat made in picking the aged first of the pair of blades up from that table in the now; realizing he was staring: realizing " ..you recognize these? Doesn't look like anything I've seen you carry. " and getting Sam to turn and take a step or two, and look too: almost a match.

_'Keep that one, Barnes. It likes you. And.. let Rogers read that half of my answer on it, will you.'_ calling back at him from seventy years in past before he was almost gone over that ridge.

_'Wrath!'_ just the briefest pause as he was swinging his rifle back down off his shoulder.

" I know it, yeah. " came out at a laughing crack not a one of those there got in the slightest. Looked at him and then each other funny for, while Sam took in the forged-in text across the bridge of the worn blade's flat. " _'Honor..'_ " The out of place, newer multi-limbed etching near the hilt pulling Sam's brows up. " ...really? Doesn't seem like a Hydra trait to me. "

_'I'll get you that drink later!'_ from Bucky leaning against the nearest tank, before he was just gone.

" That's because it's not Hydra's _make._ They put that squid-stamp on late. I'm surprised they let Buck keep it at all... but I imagine, it served as a reminder. Even if _not,_ the one they might have intended. " had him nodding at the other one; had Steve hanging back where he was, knowing what he'd see when he made the request; somehow. It wasn't _just_ the feeling. It wasn't any of that, that had spiked the view.

Not the betrayal, or the fear. Not the rush or the trust, or the surprise. None of that was really the same. None of it: except this. This one little thing, so small and so monumental; the one person who managed to slip in silently next to him, and tap his shoulder: to point at the path ahead and between out in the dark and say Go to get him moving. He just hadn't seen it. " Show me the other one. " Because it was what he hadn't done that was the same here.Then and now, he hadn't seen him there. Had been so focused on Bucky, he hadn't even looked.

Just hadn't turned his head back then to look and see him _before_ he had taken off into that small line of tanks.

Or today; before they'd started their run to jump into their separate carriers to take them down.

But he'd still been there. Still come along, regardless of the risk. Still saved Nicks ass, and his, and Sam's once or twice. Covered and pulled Natasha out of being seen in the Mall above when she came looking. Saved them by a skins-width or much more. " _'...Loyalty?_ ' " pulled Steve's eyes closed, had the snorting laugh out his nose and hands balling into fists in his pockets as Sam commented on that and their appearance, too. " ..kinda weird they look like they'd match if one didn't look a couple centuries older. "

" Not weird at all.. _not from him._ I should have guessed. It's only about a century though. Well.. a _little_ less _than._ " with the smile that he couldn't help; eyes sliding from the mismatched age on the matched blades. " God, he's _still_ a sneaky bastard; keeping that to himself. " The near tears weren't easy to keep in his eyes either; getting the message he'd been left with the slight prop of his own shield staring back at him from the tabletop at that angle. " Seventy years to read the other half of that reply, huh... "

Rogers didn't have to look to know they were brushing the edges but weren't entirely following as he himself made a much more relaxed step to collect his shield first. Or meet two of those looks when he held out his hand for one knife and then the other after he'd tucked the first into his belt. He did look to Nick though, when they were in place. Gave him a sigh and raise of his brows for that 'I'm catching on' expression that went with the fact that " We ain't gonna find 'em, _are_ we. " that Steve could not argue with.

" Probably not. And.. " passing him up again, a slap to his shoulder. " I'm not inclined to help you find them, either. Even if I _do_ want _and_ plan to look myself. " got him another look he didn't meet with the first step past the former Shield Director. " You understand? Or do you need me to bring these knives up to eye level for you to read my answers why? "

No comment, no questions. " I'll be in the car. We found what they wanted me to find. " And a lot fewer old regrets, added in with a few new ones on the way out again.

It had been briefer back then. Buck telling them the reasons they really hadn't needed to hear. Things they already knew, but really had needed to have reinforced; even if they hadn't known they had needed that then. Things in the oaths that even then were starting to be taken for granted, the longer it went on. Things that didn't just apply to one flag or the other. Not nations then, not other things now. The colors that were just different portions of the same side. The lines between how it was done versus the why, the morals, the reasons especially.

Different sometimes; harsh in one part, with one squad where they were often gentler as another, but again: all the same side.

He knew the words that connected between that had been scratched on his shield's bars where the vibranium wasn't; where they could leave it for him anyway; even before he felt them there. Even without looking. Just like somewhere, even before Loki had stopped and without barely a couple of seconds to consider in New York before letting him in; he'd known it, felt the edges of who he had been and who he was standing there in front of him, telling him about what had happened to the Scepter.

Even before he'd handed both to him then, well before he'd cut them in to admit it now.. almost what? Two years as partners, later. This time, settling in after he'd closed the door, while Sam was still pulling his closed behind him next to him: he did look. And so did Sam.

When he looked up at him; it was to see that the words and their meaning and where they were placed weren't lost on Sam Wilson either, in that slow smile before he looked out his window with it still on his face. Natasha settled in at a brief pause catching the expressions between them. Nick, starting the car up on a sigh; and Steve was still smiling a little, and wiping the unspilt tears from his eyes when Fury asked.

" ...you gonna tell me what he left on the shield to match? " as they made that three point turn to get out ahead of the team already starting to try and get enough folks over to help them put that door back into place. Seal it back up. " Unless I'm _wrong_ and I didn't pick up _a **damned** thing,_ while we were here? "

" Yeah. It's not _just for me,_ any more. But that's the point. It never was, even if I _do_ seem to keep ending up one of the recipients in front. " There was no welding strong enough to divide those memories again now, though. And it wasn't the kind of promise he wanted to keep just to himself anyway, not forever. It wasn't the kind he could, moving forward. Nick was listening. All of them were listening, after today. Not just needing, but wanting to hear the reminder, for once. The reaffirmation. So he gave it to them, and let them read it however they would. Just like he had

" _Dignity._ And, _Trust._ "

Steve wondered; can they see his shadow now?

Can they feel his hand on their shoulders?

That tap.

That simple silken near whisper, telling them to carry those words even in the dark; and..

" ** _Go!_ **"

**Author's Note:**

> Like Lokiverse? Want to see more peeks, or maybe just occasionally get subjected to the music and crazy muse outbursts that happen on my dash?  
> Okay and yeah; I have a tumblr! Feel free to check it out, starting with the full listing of platovember prompted series and personal letters attached to them with the link below.
> 
> https://blindtaleteller.tumblr.com/search/platovember


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